Social Perception and Social Reality (Jussim 2012) reviews the evidence in social psychology and related fields and reaches three conclusions: (1) Although errors, biases, and self-fulfilling prophecies in person perception are real, reliable, and occasionally quite powerful, on average, they tend to be weak, fragile, and fleeting. (2) Perceptions of individuals and groups tend to be at least moderately, and often highly accurate. (3) Conclusions based on the research on error, bias, and self-fulfilling prophecies routinely greatly overstate their power and pervasiveness, and consistently ignore evidence of accuracy, agreement, and rationality in social perception. The weight of the evidence – including some of the most classic research widely interpreted as testifying to the power of biased and self-fulfilling processes – is that interpersonal expectations relate to social reality primarily because they reflect rather than cause social reality. This is the case not only for teacher expectations, but also for social stereotypes, both as perceptions of groups, and as the bases of expectations regarding individuals. The time is long overdue to replace cherry-picked and unjustified stories emphasizing error, bias, the power of self-fulfilling prophecies, and the inaccuracy of stereotypes, with conclusions that more closely correspond to the full range of empirical findings, which includes multiple failed replications of classic expectancy studies, meta-analyses consistently demonstrating small or at best moderate expectancy effects, and high accuracy in social perception.

I suggest that the Stereotype Rationality Hypothesis (Jussim 2012) is only partially right. I agree it is rational to rely on stereotypes, but in the complexity of real world social interactions, most of our individuating information invokes additional stereotypes. Despite assumptions to the contrary, there is reason to think theory of mind is not accurate, and social psychology's denial of stereotype accuracy led us toward mindreading/theory of mind – a less accurate account of how we understand other people.

In his 2012 book, Jussim suggests that people's beliefs about various groups (i.e., their stereotypes) are largely accurate. We unpack this claim using the distinction between generic and statistical beliefs – a distinction supported by extensive evidence in cognitive psychology, linguistics, and philosophy. Regardless of whether one understands stereotypes as generic or statistical beliefs about groups, skepticism remains about the rationality of social judgments.

Research on trustworthiness perception from faces has unfolded in a way that is strikingly reminiscent of Jussim's narrative in his 2012 book. Jussim's analysis warns us against overemphasizing evidence about prejudice over evidence about accuracy, when both are scant; and reminds us to hold all accounts to the same standards, whether they call on societal biases or true signals.

I suggest two ways in which Jussim's extensive discussion (in his 2012 book) could be enriched: first, by exploring the distinction between perceptual judgments and interpretive judgments; second, by considering the power of expectations to be self-fulfilling in the case of young children and the case of fragile egos.

This commentary uses the dynamic of identity-protective cognition to pose a friendly challenge to Jussim (2012). Like other forms of information processing, this one is too readily characterized as a bias. It is no mistake, however, to view identity-protective cognition as generating inaccurate perceptions. The “bounded rationality” paradigm incorrectly equates rationality with forming accurate beliefs. But so does Jussim's critique.

Jussim's critique of social psychology's embrace of error and bias is needed and often persuasive. In opting for perceptual realism over social constructivism, however, he seems to ignore a third choice – a cognitive constructivism which has a long and distinguished history in the study of nonsocial perception, and which enables us to understand both accuracy and error.

An evolutionary approach highlights that accuracy should be expected over error because selection pressures will have shaped social perception to be functional. Behaviour is extremely complex and so it is unlikely that observers will be perfectly accurate, but an evolutionary view strongly predicts that people will behave as rational observers and in many cases social perception should favour adaptive responses.

Why is social bias and its depressing effects on low-status or low-performing groups exaggerated? We show that the higher intelligence of academics has at best a very weak effect on reducing their bias, facilitates superficially justifying their biases, and may make them better at understanding the benefits of social conformity in general and competitive altruism specifically. We foresee a surge in research examining these mechanisms and recommend, meanwhile, reviving and better observing scientific ideals.

An adaptationist analysis of beliefs yields the prediction that we ought to expect accuracy in the cognitive systems which generate them – stereotypes or otherwise – for the most part. There are, however, some limited situations in which some inaccuracy in beliefs advertised to others might be adaptive.

Individual autonomy, as constructed in the postmodern era, is violated by stereotypes, which makes stereotype accuracy morally unpalatable. Yet people are clustered and homogenized by social forces, entailing some accuracy in stereotypes. This tension can be ameliorated by unveiling the constructed nature of autonomous selfhood, and explaining why social clustering has occurred and been adaptive.

Social reality of a group emerges from interpersonal perceptions and beliefs put to action under a host of environmental conditions. By extending the study of fast-and-frugal heuristics, we view social perceptions as judgment tools and assert that perceptions are ecologically rational to the degree that they adapt to the social reality. We maintain that the veracity of both stereotypes and base rates, as judgment tools, can be determined solely by accuracy research.

In his 2012 book Jussim argues that the self-fulfilling prophecy and expectancy effects of descriptive stereotypes are not potent shapers of social reality. However, his conclusion that descriptive stereotypes per se do not shape social reality is premature and overly reductionist. We review evidence that suggests descriptive stereotypes do have a substantial influence on social reality, by virtue of their influence on collective action.

The validity and reliability of stereotypes in social perception confirms traditional early social psychological research. Already in 1954 Gordon Allport stated that stereotypes might have a “kernel of truth.” Recent research in social neuroscience, however, contradicts Lee Jussims’ (2012) claim that the application of stereotypes increases accuracy in person perception. Person perception is inaccurate as it is insufficient when it involves only one factor (even if that factor was a reliable predictor).

This commentary on Jussim (2012) makes two points: (1) Effect sizes often reflect artifacts of experimental design rather than real-world relevance, and (2) any argument dependent on effect sizes must correct for attenuation due to instrument reliabilities. A formula for making this correction is presented, and its ramifications on the debate over accuracy in person perception are discussed.

Exaggerated claims about inaccuracy and downplaying veracity can also be found in research on memory. This commentary on Jussim's 2012 book analyzes these developments in connection with schema and the misinformation effect's purported role in memory distortion. It concludes by looking back to the locus classicus of memory distortion (viz. Bartlett 1932), which in fact provides a more nuanced account of inaccuracy.

This commentary places Jussim (2012) in dialogue with sociological perspectives on social reality and the political-academic nature of scientific paradigms. Specifically, we highlight how institutions, observers, and what is being observed intersect, and discuss the implications of this intersection on measurement within the social world. We then identify similarities between Jussim's specific narrative regarding social perception research, with noted patterns of scientific change.

In my Précis of Social Perception and Social Reality (Jussim 2012, henceforth abbreviated as SPSR), I argued that the social science scholarship on social perception and interpersonal expectancies was characterized by a tripartite pattern: (1) Errors, biases, and self-fulfilling prophecies in person perception were generally weak, fragile, and fleeting; (2) Social perceptions were often quite accurate; and (3) Conclusions appearing throughout the social psychology scientific literature routinely overstated the power and pervasiveness of expectancy effects, and ignored evidence of accuracy. Most commentators concurred with the validity of these conclusions. Two, however, strongly disagreed with the conclusion that the evidence consistently has shown that stereotypes are moderately to highly accurate. Several others, while agreeing with most of the specifics, also suggested that those arguments did not necessarily apply to contexts outside of those covered in SPSR. In this response, I consider all these aspects: the limitations to the tripartite pattern, the role of politics and confirmation biases in distorting scientific conclusions, common obstructions to effective scientific self-correction, and how to limit them.

Financial and prosocial biases in favor of attractive adults have been documented in the labor market, in social transactions in everyday life, and in studies involving experimental economic games. According to the taste-based discrimination model developed by economists, attractiveness-related financial and prosocial biases are the result of preferences or prejudices similar to those displayed toward members of a particular sex, racial, ethnic, or religious group. Other explanations proposed by economists and social psychologists maintain that attractiveness is a marker of personality, intelligence, trustworthiness, professional competence, or productivity. Evolutionary psychologists have argued that attractive adults are favored because they are preferred sexual partners. Evidence that stereotypes about attractive people are causally related to financial or prosocial biases toward them is weak or nonexistent. Consistent with evolutionary explanations, biases in favor of attractive women appear to be more consistent or stronger than those in favor of attractive men, and biases are more consistently reported in interactions between opposite-sex than same-sex individuals. Evolutionary explanations also account for increased prosocial behavior in situations in which attractive individuals are simply bystanders. Finally, evolutionary explanations are consistent with the psychological, physiological, and behavioral changes that occur when individuals are exposed to potential mates, which facilitate the expression of courtship behavior and increase the probability of occurrence of mating. Therefore, multiple lines of evidence suggest that mating motives play a more important role in driving financial and prosocial biases toward attractive adults than previously recognized.

Research corroborates the notion that fundamental social motives play an important role in biases that favor attractive people. Although an adaptationist framework expects favorable social effects of good looks in most situations and contexts, it simultaneously allows for potential negative social reactions and outcomes that may be elicited by physical attractiveness in other contexts. These effects of attractiveness reflect the reproductive opportunities and threats posed by potential mates and rivals.